Textile-fiber mixing chambers have been disclosed for instance in the DE-PS No. 28 37 785 (equivalent to U.S. Pat. No. 4,264,241, issued Apr. 28, 1981). and in "Sonderdruck aus Melliand Textilberichte 53 (1972), 1216 to 1221". There the charging device is a so-called travelling resp. telescope-fitted cyclone device which is employed for piling up fibrous material in layers within the chamber. The chamber is emptied by a blender emptier or a fiber mixing and removing device which is, for example, constructed as a discharge mill at one end of the chamber. This mill is connected by means of a second telescopic tube to a suction or extraction fan. The second telescopic tube travels together with the blender emptier into the chamber to be emptied. The discharge mill mills off in a vertical direction the material stock within the chamber.
Contrary to known mixing chamber apparatus, the present invention is concerned with mixing chambers for textile fibers where a blender emptier cannot be brought into the mixing chamber. For emptying the mixing chamber, the blender emptier is postioned at an open front end of the mixing chamber. The textile-fiber material is moved into the working area of the blender emptier by an endless conveyor which is supported by the chamber floor. By means of such a system the whole weight of the material stock which is in the chamber presses on the endless conveyor which consists of a flexible conveyor belt, so that considerable abrasion appears between this flexible conveyor belt and the supporting chamber floor. Considerable traction force, therefore, has to be exerted on the conveyor belt, requiring the conveyor belt itself to have considerable tensile strength. On the other hand, increased difficulties occur when transmitting the driving power to such conveyor belt, particularly in mixing chambers with a working width between 2 and 4 m which often have a chamber length between 3 and 20 m and a filling height between 2.5 and 5 m.
Accordingly, the object of the invention is to provide measures for textile-fiber mixing chambers of the foregoing type which lead to a simplified construction of the endless conveyor and reduces susceptibility to problems.